“Rajah Sun and Moon Aeroplane Spectacles exemplar. Pardon Star Mudji.”
Quick as a flash Zeph hauled out the written screed he had acquired while in the company of the conspirators. It comprised the formula of their cypher code.
“Advise Jem and Parsons,” he translated at once. “Barn loft plunder. Get me bail.” “Who to, Ralph?” he inquired eagerly--“the telegram.”
“Mrs. Hannah Clifton, Dunbar Station.”
“A relative, I’ll bet. You’re right, we’ve got the clew! ‘Barn loft plunder.’ Ralph, Dunbar Station, quick!”
“Yes,” said the young dispatcher quietly, “that’s our terminus, as quick as we can make it.”
Ralph’s special pass furnished him by the road officer came in good.
It brought them a lift on an urgency locomotive and another on the tender of the Daylight Express. At three o’clock that afternoon after due inquiry the two friends approached a house in a lonely settlement at the edge of Dunbar Station.
As they neared the house a woman knitting on its steps arose hurriedly, ran into the house and shut every door and window about the place.
“Acts sort of scared, eh?” suggested Zeph, as they approached the front of the house.